Although this view has previously been identified with the first of the library rooms - the Great or West Library - contemporary plans demonstrate that the room shown here can only be the East Library, added in 1772-3 parallel to the Great Library. In 1774 its roof was raised to accommodate the new Marine Gallery for the display of the King’s models of ships and seaports, described by a German visitor in 1786. The operation of the wind-dial over the chimneypiece was described to the same German visitor by Justin Vulliamy, father of the maker. This view indicates something of both the quantity of books and the potential for disorganisation which prevailed in the library by the end of George III’s reign. The portfolio labelled ‘Hollar’, propped up against the side of a desk, suggests that part of the collection of prints and drawings may have been kept in this area.

The Great, Octagon and East Libraries were the only rooms in the King’s Apartments for which interior views are known. In 1766 Mrs Lybbe Powys described the King’s rooms as ‘fitted up rather neatly elegant than profusely ornamental’. Pyne commented that ‘although sufficiently spacious to admit of splendid decoration, [they] are remarkable for their plainness, being in character with those habits of simplicity which some great men have affected, but which in his Majesty George III were the offspring of a genuine love of domestic quiet in the bosom of his family. They are not without decoration, however; but the ornaments selected by this virtuous sovereign are such as change not with the fashions of the times.’

Catalogue entry adapted from George III & Queen Charlotte: Patronage, Collecting and Court Taste, London, 2004